While I often disagree with Benjamin Wittes, I rarely think the stuff he writes is sheer nonsense. This post, which attempts to rebut Eugene Robinson’s column on Assassination by Robot, is an exception. I disagree, respectfully, with most of his post. But this bit I find just mindboggling. My former colleague Eugene Robinson has a [...]

Last we heard of Dennis Kucinich’s request to visit Bradley Manning, the Pentagon had spent a full month referring his request from one official to another rather than respond to his request. On February 4, Dennis Kucinich asked DOD to allow him to visit Bradley Manning so he could assess his conditions of confinement. On [...]

Obama has declared that he has the authority under the 2001 AUMF to indefinitely hold anyone “if it is necessary to protect against a significant threat to the security of the United States.” He doesn’t say that person has to be a terrorist, much less part of al Qaeda. He doesn’t say that person has [...]

On February 4, Dennis Kucinich asked DOD to allow him to visit Bradley Manning so he could assess his conditions of confinement. On February 8, Robert Gates wrote Kucinich a short note telling him we was referring his request to Secretary of the Army, John McHugh. In a letter dated February 24–but apparently not received [...]

Robert Chesney had an interesting observation about the inter-agency group Dafna Linzer reports is working on some kind of statement with regards to Congress’ restrictions on Obama’s ability to move detainees from Gitmo to the US: the apparent non-participation of DOD in the group. Second, and perhaps relatedly, note that the story also describes the interagency [...]

As I noted yesterday (and Glenn has examined at more length), in addition to asserting that the government can target Anwar al-Awlaki … because they said so, the Obama Administration also invoked state secrets in its motion to dismiss the ACLU/CCR suit challenging targeted killings. The Obama Administration has officially positioned itself to the right [...]

The most striking aspect of the government’s motion to dismiss the ACLU/CCR lawsuit challenging the use of targeted killing is that the government does not commit to the basis for its authority to kill an American citizen like Anwar al-Awlaki with no review. This starts as soon as the filing tries to lay the ground [...]

I wanted to add to what David Dayen had to say about these two stories. Last week, the WaPo quoted at least two military figures stating, as fact, that the Taliban was a bigger threat to the US mission in Afghanistan than corruption. Based on that judgment, the WaPo suggests “military officials” are now pursuing [...]

The WaPo reports that the Administration has shelved plans to try Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri in military commissions. The decision at least temporarily scuttles what was supposed to be the signature trial of a major al-Qaeda figure under a reformed system of military commissions. And it comes practically on the eve of the 10th anniversary of [...]

Remember that Jeremy Scahill report that listed Colombia among the 75 places where JSOC has deployed? The Nation has learned from well-placed special operations sources that among the countries where elite special forces teams working for the Joint Special Operations Command have been deployed under the Obama administration are: Iran, Georgia, Ukraine, Bolivia, Paraguay, Ecuador, [...]